Boss all over you to try this newfangled content marketing thing? Colleagues pestering you about the need for more content? Finding it hard to focus on tried and tested methods like cold-calling, direct mail and banners? Don’t worry, we’ve got your back. Here are 11 tips on how to fail completely at content marketing. We guarantee it! Follow these and you can get back to the important stuff again.

1. 11 ways to
screw up
content marketing
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2. Boss all over you to try this newfangled content
marketing thing? Colleagues pestering you
about the need for more content? Finding it
hard to focus on tried and tested methods like
cold-calling, direct mail and banners?
Don’t worry, we’ve got your back. Here are 11
tips on how to fail completely at content
marketing. We guarantee it! Follow these and
you can get back to the important stuff again.
JG COMMUNICATION

3. 1. Practice inside-out thinking
The best way to get your customers to ignore
your content is to talk exclusively about what
you think is important, not what those
customers care about.
Never pay any attention to what they need and
you will lose them completely.
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4. 2. Target everyone
audience – go as broad as you can. That way
your content will never be relevant or useful
to anyone.
Oh, and make sure that everyone at your
company has a say, about everything
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5. 3. Make it hard to read
Pile on the acronyms and terms that nobody
outside your company has ever heard of. And
combine it with long and winding sentences.
If you do it properly, they will have to send for
the team that cracked the Enigma code to
understand your copy.
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6. 4. Strategy – Just say no!
Don’t let them talk you in to creating a strategy,
that could spell success. Avoid it at all cost!
Instead, try to be random and inconsistent. If
you do it right, you’ll keep both your colleagues
and customers off guard. And your content will
suffer.
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7. 5. Keep the silos
Make sure your company’s business units or
departments don’t talk to each other or align
their activities.
With some effort, no one will focus on the
customers. Instead they will spend their time
arguing about whose content should get the
most visibility
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8. 6. Think channels, not content
the channels. Never use the same content in
more than one channel, because that could save
both time and money.
spends any time there.
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9. 7. Ignore the brand
Make sure your content is all over the place, in
tonality as well as look. Otherwise your
customers might start to recognize what you
do, and, heaven forbid, even like it.
Change the style of your imagery frequently.
Use different fonts. Use different ways of talking
to your target audience. That should teach
them!
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10. 8. Avoid social media
We all know social media is just hype, but best
to stay away from it anyway to be on the safe
Facebook, Twitter and whatever else the kids
are using these days.
Oh, and never interact with anyone in social
media. Communication is supposed to be a oneway street.
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11. 9. Make it hard to
Today, almost everything begins with a search.
your content. Skip the metadata and make sure
your website lacks all structure.
Ideally, try to make it entirely in Flash. That
should stump even Google.
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12. 10. If it’s broken, don’t
Never take care of your content. Broken links,
removed pages, old or erroneous information –
leave them there for all eternity.
And never measure what happens with your
content. That way you’ll never be able to
answer any questions about how your content
marketing is progressing
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13. 11. Don’t go for tech
Keep to your tried and tested methods – don’t
let all these strange innovations that are part of
content marketing sway you from your course.
Marketing automation, social tools, big data,
pipeline marketing – avoid them all like the
plague!
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14. Piece of cake! Right?
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15. Or do you actually want
to succeed with your
content marketing?
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16. Then just do the exact opposite of what we have
suggested. All these “tips” are actually based on
what we know works – how to create content
that is both valuable to your target audience
and meets your business goals. We’ve just
turned them upside-down.
Want to learn more? Get in touch with us and
we’ll be happy to share what we know:
www.jgcommunication.se
@JGCommunication
+46 8 610 20 00 | SVARVARGATAN 7, SE-100 28 STOCKHOLM | E-MAIL: HEJ@JGCOMMUNICATION.SE
JG COMMUNICATION